How to TRUST Your GUT | Mel Robbins' Lessons

Good morning, Believe Nation! It's Evan. My one word is believe. I believe in you, and I want to see that awesome thing that you have inside you explode out into the universe to have a major impact. So to help you on your path, today's message is listen to your gut. Over to you, Mel Robbins.

When I was 22, right after I graduated from Dartmouth, I was so focused on making everyone happy that I almost chose the worst possible career for my personality. It's not a bad career, it just would have been horrendous for me. I was interested in the environment, so I decided, "Oh, you know, I'll go get a law degree and then I'll go work in Washington. And I think maybe I'll work on environmental policy." And I'd probably end up in some cube farm. And everyone was thrilled with the plan. Everyone, it turns out, but me. So here I am, I'm driving a U-Haul across country to go to law school and to get a degree in environmental law. And something started to gnaw at me. And with every single mile that I drove, my thoughts were getting louder. And doubts were starting to pour in. My gut was telling me, "Mel, turn the damn U-Haul around. But the problem was that everything was already in place, right? I mean, I'm already in the U-Haul, the thing is already packed, I'm already 10 miles into my drive, the tuition had been paid for the first semester, I had signed a lease. I mean, I could not undo these things. Isn't that why it's so difficult for you to make changes in your life? Because you think that things can't be undone? The fact is, any excuse that you come up with, you can undo. Tuition can be reimbursed, apartments can be leased, Plan B can be invented. So I got up, I repacked that U-Haul, and I drove out of town. I let myself make a U-turn in life. If you ever find your gut battling your head, save yourself the drama. I guarantee you, your gut is right. Guarantee you, your excuses can be undone. And I guarantee you, you can make a U-turn in your life right now if you want to.

You should make big decisions with your heart or your gut and small decisions with your head. Here's why: your head only understands the world that currently exists. It's logical, it's practical, and it's also needed. You don't want to throw away all rationale, throw away all logic like that. Keeps you alive too. You need it. But if you have a big decision that you need to make in your life, the worst idea is to make a list of pros and cons and then try to evaluate them, because you're trying to make a decision with your head that really should be made with your heart. Because it doesn't matter if you have 10 things on the pro list, if there's one thing on the con that goes against what you're really feeling in your heart or your gut, you can't do it. Your head or your brain only understands a world that currently exists, and that is a world that is made up by other people. That world was created by others and is being forced upon you. And so if you're making decisions purely with your head, then you're living in somebody else's world. They went off and created all these amazing things and created all these rules for living, and now you're just following them. Where if you want to think about things with your heart, the vision, the big dream, the things that don't exist yet, that's something your brain doesn't really understand. That's not logical, that's not practical, because it doesn't exist yet. But that's what you're trying to create with your life. If you want to create a life that has already been lived by somebody else, then just follow that path, listen to your head, and that's your safe, logical, practical thing to do. If you want to create a path, a life that is unique to you, you're going to have to break the mold somewhere. You cannot just live your parents' life, your grandparents' life, the life that your guidance counselors want you to live, or the rest of your family, or your culture. All those lives have been lived before. You want to live your life, and that can only be done by doing something that is different. And that something that is different is going to be the powerful thing that comes from here. It has to be an emotional decision to break free of the rules, break free of the norms, break free of what your parents want you to do and say, "I'm gonna go down this scary path that hasn't been done before." And then what you do is you use your head to figure out the plan. If you start with the head, your heart will never catch up. If you start with the heart, the passion, the excitement, the love, the interest, then your brain can catch up. You see, I'm going to go out, I'm going to go out and create a billion entrepreneurs. I want to help a billion entrepreneurs. The head comes in and says, well, you know, that's not practical, that's not logical. Are there even a billion entrepreneurs? How are you going to track that? How are you going to measure that? You know, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, all the reasons why it's not going to work out. Which one do I listen to? It's the heart. I'm going to go out and do this. Head, help me figure out how to do it. The big goal, the big actions have to come from the heart, have to come from your place of passion. And then your head will help you figure out how to go and accomplish it, not the other way around. So whenever you're in a moment of crisis, whenever you're trying to make a big decision, whenever you're afraid, whenever you're thinking about some new big thing that you want to do, the break out on your own path into something that's never been done before, that's going to be uniquely yours, I hope you will have the courage to listen to your heart and not your head. So the question of the day today is, I'm curious, what is the biggest decision that you made with your heart when your head said, "No way, that's impossible"? Let me know, leave in the comments below. I think sharing it will be great for you to release and feel the joy of sharing it, but I think also it can inspire a lot of people who are reading the comments and following along as well. So leave it down in the comments. I also wanna give a quick shout out to Michelle Barkdoll. Michelle, thank you so much for picking up a copy of my book, "Your One Word". It really, really, really means a lot to me, and I hope you're enjoying the read. Thank you guys again for watching. I hope you have an amazing day. I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever your one word is. Much love, and I'll see you again tomorrow morning for another shot of espresso. I wake up every morning, espresso keep me going.

Recently, I was with a bunch of other investors who I respect, and they brought me a deal. And I wanted to be part of it, but it didn't feel right. And I wrote millions of dollars on that one, and it just didn't feel right, and I lost it all within 2 years.

So should investors trust their gut then?

Absolutely, and trust your gut.

But what about you said earlier, don't be emotional, and sometimes the gut is emotional.

No, this is a barometer of risk. It's something internalized for an investor that says, "I don't feel comfortable." It's not about emotion, it's just Don't write that check. That was recently the first time I didn't listen to that and I lost everything. So now my radar is up. I listen to my gut. It's not an emotion. It's an index of risk. And you get it as you age. You become a better investor every year. If only I could live to 200, I'd be really good.

There was a lot of encouragement to trust my instincts, you know, the instinct of use your presence, you know what I'm saying? Like in South Africa, you know, I'm, you know, Obviously I'm not South African, so I was really aware that, oh God, I'm gonna walk into rooms where people have been, lived, seen, smelt, touched, felt Mr. Mandela in person, on the radio, on television, and here I come as an outsider doing this, you know, portrayal of him. I was really aware, it used to make me very nervous about, you know, if I'm gonna do it right or not. And Justin encouraged me to stay with what my gut was. Just stay with that. Don't waver from it. Don't try to be their Mandela or the Mandela they think you should be. Be that guy we've discussed in all the rehearsals and all the script meetings. Be that guy. Go with that thing. So that was great, actually. To Justin's credit, he really helped me sculpt and measure out that performance.

When I went to Bloomingdale's, the buyer said, We like your ties, Ralph, but would you make them narrower? And would you— we don't want to use your label, we want to use our own label, but we'll give you a really good order. Now here I was, no business, and hungry, and I said to the buyer, I said, my heart's in my throat, or whatever the expression is. I would love to sell Bloomingdale's. They were the hottest store, young, hot, store, I said, but I can't sell you. I'm closing my bag, and I'm not going to sell you. 6 months later, they called me back. Wow. And they said, Ralph, we can't find your ties anywhere, and we want to buy them, and we want to put a rack in, a rack of ties amongst the other ties. And that was it. The breakthrough was they bought it. The breakthrough for me is that I learned to trust my instincts. I learned to trust my own sense. Because the normal thing to do is say, "I'll make it any way you want to." I mean, that's how the world was. You want to— I want to sell you the ties, you know, maybe I'll have a new fashion for you next year, let me buy it. My philosophy was that I love these ties. I made them. They were not just a business to me. They were my voice to myself.

Let me give you the one word secret to happiness. One word.

This is all you need to be happy.

The most important word ever. If you had to think of one word that's most important to you or that sums you up or that would be kind of like a little beacon.

Hey, Believe Nation! If you want to know what the most important one word is for Tony Robbins, Gary Vaynerchuk, Oprah Winfrey, Will.i.am, and Howard Schultz, I have a very special secret video for you. Check the description for details.